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2022-11-D4-AW: November 2022 Sesshin, Day 4: The Teachings of Maurine Stuart-roshi 4 | Otter.ai

2022-11-D4-AW: November 2022 Sesshin, Day 4: The Teachings of Maurine Stuart-roshi 4

John Pulleyn51min

Sensei Amala Wrightson

00:00

Today is the fourth day of our seven day sesshin, second of November 2022 and we got to take up another chapter in "Subtle Sound: the Zen Teachings of Maureen Stewart", edited by Roco Sherry Chayat. And this chapter is entitled, "Peace of mind".

Sensei Amala Wrightson

00:27

Bodhidharma was already an old man when he made the long three year journey from India to China in 520, of our common era. And the story of what happened when he paid his respects to the emperor who is well known. The Emperor thought of himself as a very good Buddhist. He had built monasteries, he had seen to it that sacred texts were transcribed, he had done many things that he considered exceptionally fine. But when he asked Bodhidharma, about the merit do him for all of this, much to his shock and surprise, Bodhidharma said, no merit none.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

01:15

The problem the problem with all of impro Wu's efforts were that he was proud of them. There's a saying from the Tibetan tradition. Something something like this. Pride follows our good deeds like a ghost that never leaves. And of course, pride reinforces our sense of self. So it is diametrically opposed to what we're trying to do in practicing the Dharma, which is to erode our self importance to wear it away, to see through it

Sensei Amala Wrightson

02:12

it's not just in Buddhism, that that pride is seen as a problem. Had the saying and in the waste of pride comes before a fall.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

02:33

Rumi talks about pride as well.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

02:44

He's talking about a poem which has an image in it of a pig X. And Colin box who put together this anthology, on theology comments on this on this poem, that we'll read them. He says one view of identity is that it's a structure made of what we identify with. Rumi says that identity must be torn down, completely demolished, along with its little tailoring shop, the patch sewing, of eating and drinking constellations. In other words, eating and drinking for comfort. It in a work is not all ecstatic surrender, don't listen to often Rumi advisors to the comforting part of the self that gives you what you want. Pray instead for a stop a tough instructor. Nothing less than the radical dissembling of what we've wanted and gotten. And what we still wish for allows us to discover the value of true being that like that lies underneath. The pickaxe for Rumi represents whatever does this fierce attention work. Clear discernment a teacher's presence, simple strength and honesty with oneself. The pickaxe dismantles the illusory personality, and finds to glimpse in the dirt like eyes they are, but these jewel lights are not personal. Rumi points to a treasure within our lives unconnected to experience. It is intrinsic beyond calculation, a given reached after the ego is cleared away, and a one pointedness digs under the promises. Think here of one of the cons and in the Hekiganroku were Oman's all mine says between heaven and earth through space and time. There is one and treasure hidden in the mountain of form this one treasure what is it

Sensei Amala Wrightson

05:11

to to apprehend this one treasure to, to touch it, we have to do this work of, of eroding our self importance

Sensei Amala Wrightson

05:26

here's the here's the poem that this commentary refers to

Sensei Amala Wrightson

05:43

tear down this house 100,000 new houses can be built from the transparent yellow Carnelian buried beneath it. And the only way to get to that treasure is to do the work of demolishing and then digging under the foundations. With that value in hand, all the new construction will be done without effort. And anyway, sooner or later this house will fall down on its own. The Jewel treasure will be uncovered, but it won't be yours then the buried wealth is your pay for doing the demolition. The pick and shovel work. If you wait and just let it happen. You'd bite your hand and say, I don't do as I knew I should have. This is a rented house. You don't own the deed. You have a lease and you've set up a little shop where you make barely enough living sewing patches on clothing. You had only a few feet underneath two veins pure red and bright gold Carnelian Quick, take the pickaxe and pry the foundation. You got to quit the seamstress work. What does the patch sewing mean? You ask? Eating and drinking. The heavy cloak of the body is always getting torn. you patch it with food and other restless ego satisfactions. Rip up one board from the shop floor and look into the basement. You'll see two glints in the dirt the pick and shovel work that has to be done demolishing out hard construction that the ego can be unyielding

Sensei Amala Wrightson

07:44

armor that we we make for ourselves.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

08:11

She continues if you do something for the sake of merit, there is no merit. The work you do inconspicuously that nobody ever knows you did is the work that is really the most meaningful. Think of master Dugan who encouraged his students to undertake hidden acts of virtue. He emphasized that we should keep our good deeds secret and and be public about our misdeeds. The reverse of what we would tend to do we like to make ourselves feel important. Good and to hide out our shortcomings, but Dolan says flip it round the other way. Imagine what Facebook would would lose out of that people to that.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

09:27

Thought work that is not done for the sake of unexpected will reward but for the sake of the work itself. For the sake of the next person who comes along is work that is worthy. When you go to the bathroom, you leave everything as clean and neat and orderly as you found it. If you didn't find it that way, you make it that way for the next person that has true compassion. Think of those signs in in airplane bathrooms. about using your towel to clean up Little did the airlines know that they were we're asking a question in the body sattvic spirit

Sensei Amala Wrightson

10:13

we talk on Zen off and on, about leaving no traces. This is a way of talking about this kind of thinking of the person who's coming afterwards or the people who are coming after us. And it's often on small things, little things like straightening up our cushions before we leave as Andover the end of an evening setting or a morning setting. But the small things, train our minds and we build we build on that, and that can affect how we respond to bigger things.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

11:03

After his encounter with the Emperor Bodhidharma went off to a cave among some impressive clothes. He sat down facing the wall just as we do. There he sat for nine years. One day during that time, along came eka, that's Quaker, in Chinese, who had heard about the strange blue eyed monk from India. Although waker had studied the Chinese classics, new Chinese poetry had memorized the sutras and had attended lectures by the dozens, just as most of us have. For all that learning, he still did not have any peace of mind. So he arrived at Bodhidharma his place that Shorinji and asked to be taught at Shorinji. This is the jeopardized name of Shaolin Temple, which still exists. I went there with Richard in 2001 and Roshi was there many years before that, but it's mainly really now a tourist attraction controlled by forces there people there who are not Buddhist What did Bodhidharma say? No, I won't teach you the subtle and supreme teaching of the Buddha's can be understood only through through doing what is hard to do. And bearing what is hard to be how can a person have little virtue and much self conceit dream of achieving this go away? So it was the classic Zen push back and of course it's a taste

Sensei Amala Wrightson

13:12

or Institute writes, What would you do if somebody said that to you? To this day, this test is used to some degree near was zoom a, the three days of sitting outside the monastery gate before being accepted, is a way of finding out what your intention is. Why are you sitting here? Why are you sitting in this sesshin room dawn until nine o'clock or in our case 930 In the evening cleric clarifying as we've said before in the session, clarifying our intention and and knowing what it is can be very helpful when we we come up against obstacles and this this near was zoom a is a kind of formalized obstacle So Pete, the people entering the monastery know that they're gonna have to go through this this extended sitting being being pushed back every time we tried it, they try to enter

Sensei Amala Wrightson

14:44

because intention, Quakers intention was quite strong. He stood in the snow and was rejected time after time. And finally it is said he cut his arm. This is only a symbol of course. It meant that he was ready to give up his life. My mind has no peace. Please help me he begged Bodhidharma. There's also comments somewhere that Quaker in his youth was in a farming accident and had lost his arm then. But then because of her the strength of his character, much later in life when he was when he was an old monk, his his missing arm was attributed to this encounter with Bodhidharma. Which is plausible, given the way mythmaking works. There was a truth to it. Even if he hadn't cut off his own arm. There, there are accounts of people having to do this. This there was a film a few years ago about a guy who in I think it was New Mexico, he fell down a corpus and a rock, a large boulder pinned him at the bottom of this crevice. And he hoped for somebody to come and rescue him. But nobody came. He hadn't left a word of where he was intending to go. And at a certain point, he had a dream. And in the dream, he was holding a baby in his arms. And this dream was one of the things that that motivated him to do what he needed to do to get out of this, this situation. And what he needed to do was cut off his arm. There are also many recount accounts of women giving themselves C sections when for some reason they're giving birth, in isolation and things aren't going as they should.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

17:09

So, Quaker makes this this desperate plea to Bodhidharma. He begs him, and then Bodhidharma response, he can see that the time is ripe. So he says bring your mind bring it here, and I will pacify it for you. And waker response and again, we don't know whether this was minutes, hours, weeks or years later, I have searched for my mind and I cannot take hold of it. And Bodhidharma says, now your mind is pacified. Or in our vision we have I cannot find it we whereas the mind what is it? We certainly have plenty of evidence of the functioning of the mind. We're we're conscious beings, we we move and speak and open and close our eyes hear things smell things

Sensei Amala Wrightson

18:29

there is no mind to find no fixed condition, we cannot put the mind in a little cubbyhole and say there. Now I have peace of mind. We have all felt this yearning for inner calm, but nobody can help us we must do it ourselves. We have to face our own inner demons. Nobody can do that for us, we have to deal with our grabby ego, continually trying to fix everything in some permanent condition which prevents us from having peace of mind. We are convinced that our way is the right way and therefore that nobody else's way is the right way and so we become anxious. It is angry, raising waves where there is no wind as Mulan says in his commentary on the story from the gateless gate so we won't go on these these things she mentioned anxiety doesn't any unease, anger. They are the evidence of our holding too tightly to a concept of self. That we that we defend often at all costs.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

19:59

We tried to To soothe ourselves, placate ourselves reassure ourselves. But all of this is shaky. And really superfluous as we want says, raising waves where there is no wind, we put so much energy and energy into defending ourselves when that self is insubstantial.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

20:44

Sitting on the cushion, we are making arguments in our minds, what am I doing here? Am I doing this the right way? Or am I wrong? Does she like what I did? Does he approve, we're raising waves disturbing our minds instead of being so completely involved in what we're doing, that we cannot have any second thoughts about it, instead of just washing the floor or dusting the cushions, while we're working with thinking, Oh, I have to go to work tomorrow. I wonder what my boss will say and on and on. We use up so much life energy in this anxiety producing mental activity, raising waves where there's no wind.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

21:28

We one of the sort of paradoxes of a session is that even though we're sleeping less and eating less, as the session progresses, we we find we can tap into great reservoirs of energy. And what one of the reasons why we are guessing that weeds are energy increases as the season goes on is that we're doing less rumination. And we're actually freeing up a lot of psychic energy for direct experience rather than rather than rumination. Dugan gave some wonderful advice about thoughts arising inside as in when a thought arises, be awake to it, when you are awake to it, it will disappear. After a long time the associations are destroyed. And spontaneously, there is a coming to one. This is one with a capital O. This is the secret of zazzy. And

Sensei Amala Wrightson

22:51

we might these days talk of of neural pathways. But it's it's notable here that he he says when you are awake, it will disappear. Referring to the thought within he also adds after a long time associations are destroyed, and upon spontaneously or there is a coming to the one there is this issue of habit. And you could say that we have we may see through a particular pain producing behavior. But the pathway, the neural pathway for that behavior is still there. And that character work that we have to do is is the practice having seen the pattern and wearing away that neural pathway. So finally the associations in the in the brain are dissolved, and we were no longer pulled down that that pathway because it's no longer there because it's been deactivated. But over time, over a long time, as he says here. She continues, for example, we hear various sounds and our minds shift toward them. Without trying to suppress the shifting of the mind. We should inquire what is the sound? Where did it come from? What is this idea who is thinking about it? In this way we can become aware of the disturbances of the mind. By doing this over and over thoughts and fantasies vanish. After a time continuing this kind of meditation not just for one or two days, but for years and years and years. The associations are destroyed. The subject and the object which are joined by association just disappear If the subject is the mind, the object is its counterpart, the Butterfield in which the sound is heard. Like likewise with what is seen, the SIA is the subject and the scene is the object, as we continue this kind of awareness practice, the experience and the experiencer disappear. And the disappear rents of these two is this spontaneous coming together, through which we experience the one in deep samadhi, as in is nothing but this oneness gateless gate, this slightly funny turn of phrase, this oneness, this gateless, gate pneus, it is nothing but inner and outer, in breath and out breath, just this come to recognize that that inner and outer, in breath and out breath are two sides of one coin, two phases of one process.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

26:23

Life is suffering the Buddha taught, because we want some permanency, some guarantee, if we let go of this desire and just follow a path of doing finite things in an infinite way, then ordinary becomes extraordinary secular is sacred, preparing the food washing the dishes, everything is a sacred act. That's why we have altars around the place, kitchen, in the bath. Just to to remind ourselves of how the the ordinary has also this dimension of my dimension of being extraordinary, the secular sacred this path must be followed without any shortcuts. Unlike instant coffee, enlightenment isn't bought in a jar, we must walk on our own two feet alone. And when we come to the Zendo, to sit together for an evening setting or a session, we are loving, supportive companions for each other. This gives us more courage to go on alone. It is our own body, our own breath through which we experience each moment fully. The effect that we have on one another is very strong. We feel our interrelatedness very clearly. So be mindful, what is your thought? What is your intention?

Sensei Amala Wrightson

28:06

It's very important that we come together together and this this loving spirit. If if we come with any kind of of competitiveness in our in us, then that will sabotage our practice. Again, because it's self referential. It's reinforces our sense of separation. But if we if we come together in this loving and supportive way, then that stands us in good stead. And in solitary moments as well. We'll find that we can be generous and loving towards ourselves and towards our shortcomings. Not solidity solidify them without without fear and judgments. She talks here about our interrelatedness and how we can feel this very strongly. And not just those of us who are sitting here in the Zendo. But the online participants, this is something we've discovered over the pandemic is is how we can transcend distance and really feel part of something that is spatially scattered. Even when when we maybe well, almost all the online participants are sitting alone at home. But then also even when they're sitting in their their breakout room waiting for dogs on the feet. There's a feeling of connection. There is a connection Making this concerted effort together

Sensei Amala Wrightson

30:09

there's a there's a Zen sandwich which has been caught quoted often during the pandemic, face to face 1000 miles apart

Sensei Amala Wrightson

30:34

someone told me she has been finding it very difficult to follow the 10 precepts. Of course, it is difficult to follow this path unswervingly. But the three fundamental precepts of a very simple, very clear directions. Do no harm, do good. Keep your mind pure and warm. This is an alternative third one, the Tera Vaada. The third one is keep the mind pure in the Mahayana liberate all living beings. But Maureen Stewart here she she is sort of melds the two together, keep your mind pure and warm. That's that's the bodhisattva element to include others in our practice, keep them in mind and respond when our minds our motion emptied out, that's no mind in Japanese motion cleared up, then we cannot hurt anyone. We cannot really act in an inappropriate way, because we feel our interrelatedness. Have to be a little careful about this, because we may think where our minds are emptied out. And think that that we can rely on that to act appropriately. But of course, if we're thinking our minds are emptied out, they're not. Why are we here? Are we here for some self improvement? Zen is not psychotherapy. Are we here warming and purifying our minds for the sake of all sentient beings. DT Suzuki once said, Buddhists have almost nothing to do with Buddha, but very much to do with their fellow human beings. And the great Christian mystic, Meister Eckhart, a true Zen man said, if a person were in such a rapturous state, as St. Paul once into, and he knew of a sick man who needed a cup of soup, it would be better to withdraw from the rapture for love's sake, to serve Him who has a need. This is the true Zen Spirit, through bodhisattva spirit. We are not here to grab something to get something. Zen insight is not our awareness, but the Buddha minds awareness in us. So we aspire to become vessels of the Dharma at a vessel something that dispenses as well as contains. And it's important for us to question ourselves as to how we're doing that. How are we sharing this, this treasure of the Dharma

Sensei Amala Wrightson

33:49

somebody once told me he was very embarrassed when complimented about his artwork. He became quite self conscious and didn't know what to say. I told him, when somebody says to me, you play the piano beautifully. I say, Yes, I do. Thank you. I really do play beautifully, but I don't play. Something plays me. The more we come to the condition of empty doubt cleared up warmed up mind, the more easily we can let go of the self consciousness that makes us denigrate ourselves or worry about seeming conceited. We can be blessed, glared, we can make something beautiful or play beautifully. We can be glad to share it with others and glad they like it. It is not conceited to say yes, I play the piano beautifully. If I did not have to all the training all the work all the effort, it would be sad. But so it is with you. Each of you is the artist of your own life. You play your life beautifully. Hold up your hand and be glad that you can offer whatever it is you have to offer freely. A little bell hanging in the emptiness sings. Each one of us is hanging in the emptiness singing. Sometimes lover, sometimes wife, sometimes husband, sometimes artists, sometimes friend, always with open, compassionate wisdom minds

Sensei Amala Wrightson

35:29

this is a beautiful image, I imagine those little bells that sometimes hang from the eaves of, of temples, window bells, which the wind plays, we have some in our courtyard. Or perhaps we have not got them anymore, but people know what I'm talking about. Hanging in the emptiness and singing, letting the wind pass through us. Now the image that can be used for this, this role playing that she's talking about is weird. We put on different masks. We take on a role. And really what we're called to do is live that role to the hilt and then maybe in an hour or two, we're playing a different role. So leave that role to the hills.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

36:44

Next chapter is entitled no big deal

Sensei Amala Wrightson

36:58

I was in life is ordinary life. When we start adding things to it as nailgun Zen Zaki said, it's like painting legs on a snake. It'd be quite hard, I think to get the steak to sit still when you painted legs on it. But it's pointing to the fact that a snake moves beautifully. Yeah, what would what use what a snake have with legs

Sensei Amala Wrightson

37:28

just to be ordinary is the most difficult thing to be playing, to be simple not to make a fuss about anything this is as in life. To be the Rinzai is true person of no rank.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

37:52

Roshi Kapleau used to tell a story of answering the door one one Friday night, when there was going to be a workshop the next day, and leading in a workshop participant. And then the next day when he was about to give the workshop and this was people were mingling beforehand. This person came up to her and said, I'm so sorry, I didn't know that you were the teacher. Yesterday when you let me in, I thought you were the janitor. And rush to get raised to tell the story of course saying that was it was the best compliment he could have received.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

38:40

Joe should one of the greatest teachers always use what was ever at hand. His teachings were along the lines of Have you eaten your porridge? Have you washed your balls. Of course when such ordinary acts are done thoroughly, completely cheerfully, then they become extraordinary. Every single bite of porridge is tasted fully. But it is not done with the feeling of doing something special. There is no self congratulating later on in a voice saying oh look, I'm such a wonderful didn't Zen student sitting long hours doing everything so mindfully. We just do it with no thought at all about it whatever it is, to draw attention to what we are doing would be sickening and it would have nothing to do with the Zen and such paradox to be proud of our ordinariness to be to be

Sensei Amala Wrightson

39:42

taking something that is just just as it is and using it as a as a building block for our ego

Sensei Amala Wrightson

39:56

we just wash our bells washing away any excessive you So Zen terminology, any allusions to enlightenment, for our practice to become more ordinary, more real, we use words that are everybody can understand. We refer to what is right here right now. We sit, we walk, we cook, we eat, we clean. We have nosebleeds, and it's just here right here, right in front of us no big deal. This the some imaging of nosebleeds. This was probably given this talk after she was quite sick, and she was having nosebleeds and when she was in sesshin.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

40:52

thing here also in her reference to language, everybody under can understand. And I think that's one of the hallmarks of her teaching is how accessible it is, without a lot of terminology, Zen words. There's been a real effort here at the center to find English words for various items in the Zendo. And so that we're, it's not giving the impression of Zen as some kind of foreign, foreign exotic thing.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

41:33

Practicing together is a wonderful, extraordinary experience. Yet we have so much in it that we can't even talk about it. There is nothing to say every single act, everything we do is the expression of our true nature. We may not know it, we may not be aware of it. We may not even think we have any insight. But everything we do is an expression of who we are standing up sitting down, eating, drinking, laughing, crying, washing our balls, especially if we do it unselfconsciously, especially if we do it unselfconscious me but it not only if we do it unselfconsciously. Even when we do it with our mind, full of self conscious storylines that were telling us still with a wooden he was shining.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

42:39

And we have never done any of it before. This is the first setting the first kin we have ever experienced. We have fresh, completely fresh taking nothing for granted with no ideas about what Xenos everything is seen as a for the very first time. Even though the sesshin schedule may be familiar to some of us, we are going through it with keen attention really being present at each moment. Really eating our porridge really washing our bowls. And when it's done, it's done. There's nothing to hold on to nothing. She's talking of course here about beginner's mind, which is itself lost a little bit of its beginner's luster and become a bit of a cliche, but still an important principle to come to everything afresh.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

43:45

To follow the guidelines, even if one's an old old hand

Sensei Amala Wrightson

43:54

do not make assumptions about our practice and what stage we're at and how things are going to unfold.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

44:08

Nor do we hold anything back. We don't think next time things will be easier. I'll work harder. I'll be able to concentrate better. I'll do better. Right now is all we have. That's it. So be here. Let's burn up our resources unstintingly. When we think we have have something we just forget about it? We start all over again going deeper and deeper. Never thinking we have completely understood. Sometimes people ask me when did you finish yours in training? I have never finished and there's no end to it. When we think we have attained something we're in trouble. We need to wash away everything and become a beginner over and over and over again. This is why You can go back to a fundamental koan, and we're gonna work on it again. We're never finished with Mu we're never finished with what is this

Sensei Amala Wrightson

45:27

just because the starting later, trim and I forgotten what time it was when we started this morning, how much time I have left? Five more minutes, five minutes, thank you

Sensei Amala Wrightson

45:52

a young woman once called me from California to tell me she had cancer. Very worried, very upset. She said, I'm preparing to die. I said, How about preparing to live? They go together? And then I asked her, How do you know? Then I asked her, do you know any people who need help? She said lots. I told her, Well, you'd better get busy. Don't worry about that lump. Find somebody else to help. Later, it turned out that what this young woman thought was cancer was just a benign tumor. Because sometimes it isn't a benign tumor. But the point she's making here is to not extrapolate, maybe we're having really, really a lot of pain right now. But we we pile more pain on top of that pain, if we are imagining that we're doing permanent damage, or that tomorrow, it's going to be even worse, because today I was so bad. We don't know. And it's, it's there's no point in even contemplating it.

Sensei Amala Wrightson

47:39

When we let go of all our intellectual stuff, all our indirect and static knowledge, we allow ourselves to get in touch with the dynamic and direct intuitive understanding that we all have. And out of this comes real freedom, freedom to express whatever is in the moment. Like the burglar who locked his son in a chest as a way of teaching him his trade. A good Zen teacher puts the stock student in a box from which there seems to be no way out. The student must find the answer in his or her own way. This this putting Zen teacher like the like the burglar who locked his son in the chest. This is a story from from one of the masters I think it was fire in a wheelchair. And he told the story and we'll just finish with this and then continue on with the chapter tomorrow. It's it's a story that that Roshi has talked about a number of times and in teisho. And it's a way of it's a it's a metaphor extended analogy. For what what enlightened coming to awakening is like in terms of how we how we learn. The son of an ageing house breaker decided that it was about time for him to learn the provision to support the family, so he had asked his father for lessons. The father approved the proposal and took him along on the next attempt. They broken through a fence stealthily into dimension and opened a large chest. The father suggested that the son the son, step into the chest and pick out the variables we're upon the son did as soon as he got in. That father dropped the lid lock the chest, sneaked out into the courtyard, loudly knocked on the door waking the whole household and quickly retired through the hole in the fence. The excited residents scurried around with their candles and discovered the thief had gotten away. Meanwhile, the sun imprisoned in the chair test was terribly afraid. An idea flashed through his mind. He made a scary scratching sound like a mouse, at the sound of which the master of the family sent the maid to investigate. When the maid unlocked the chest out jump the boy who blew out the candle, push the maid aside and ran off with the neighbor's on his heels. Passing a well he hit on another thought. He picked up a large stone and dropped it into the well with a loud splash. Hearing the sound the pursuers all gathered around the deep and dark hole, attempting to see the burglar drowning himself. The boy ran on safely back at home, the youngster blamed the old man for the borrowing for the harrowing experience, replied the father understanding me, tell me son, how did you get away? We're upon the son recounted the events and detail and the father finally smiled and said, their son, you have now learned the art of burglary. We'll stop there and recite the four vows

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